


Fire No Guns, Shed No Tears

by vextant



Category: Iron Man (Comics), Marvel Noir
Genre: A variety of Nautical Nicknames, Gen, Iron Man Noir Compliant, James "Rhodey" Rhodes & Tony Stark Friendship, Magical Realism, Post-Iron Man Noir, Shipwrecks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-06
Updated: 2019-01-06
Packaged: 2019-09-23 04:40:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17073647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vextant/pseuds/vextant
Summary: 10 November 1813TheCaptainhas not been spotted for nigh on four days — we all fear for the cargo she carries. To lose her would be to lose our young nation’s most precious treasure, our hope of fending off Great Britain and her puppet Commonwealth once and for all.I told them not to risk it, I told them! The lake will claim what she will, and now too she holds the wealth, the legacy of this Brotherhood — nay, of these United States.—After officially retiring from adventuring in 1940, Tony Stark has found an old Freemason's journal that says there's treasure buried at the bottom of one of the Great Lakes. What he ends up dredging up is significantly more interesting than gold.





	Fire No Guns, Shed No Tears

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Fluffypanda](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fluffypanda/gifts).



> My take on "Steve is the anthropomorphic personification of a weapon Tony finds on an adventure", a gift for the incredibly imaginative Fluffypanda!
> 
> There were so many good prompts to choose from, I hope I've done this one justice! 
> 
> (Historical and other notes can be found at the end.)

**June 1941**

“Ooh. _Ooh_ , I’ve got it now. Here we go.” Tony grabs ahold of the chest with both hands and tugs, but it doesn’t come free. He can hear himself huffing and puffing — he’s never been more embarrassed that he built the radio right into the oxygen mask of his diving suit. Without an off switch.

The chest in question is early nineteenth century, made of wood, and stuck firmly in the muck and gunk and sand of this ridiculous shipwreck at the bottom of this ridiculous lake. Tony plants a foot on one of the timber ribs that no doubt once formed the hull of a proud ship — once he’s certain it won’t disintegrate from just a touch, he braces himself and tugs again.

“You’re really working up a sweat down there.” Rhodey says into his ear. “Need some help?”

He can _hear_ that smartass smirk from 200 feet underwater.

“I’ve _got it_ , thank you, Rhodes.”

On the next tug, the chest wiggles just the teeniest, tiniest, ittiest-bittiest bit. Tony’s not really sure what he expected. If he’s got his numbers right — and he always does — it’s been buried for almost 130 years.

“There we go, come on baby, you got it, come on.” He finds himself mutterring. It’s really exhausting — after all, the chest is roughly the size of a barrel.

Eventually, it comes free with a distorted, underwater _squelch_. Disturbed sand puffs up in clouds around him and cuts his field of vision down to only about three feet in any direction, including up. The chest itself is heavy and light at the same time — pulling something that size through water is certainly easier than carrying it on land, but the weight of century-old Freemason gold is a burden Tony will certainly bear.

He grabs ahold of the chain with one hand and his tether, his cord to the surface, in the other. “I’ve got it free, making my way out of the wreck now.”

“Took you quite a minute there. You have Pepper worried.”

The way he says it makes Tony fairly sure that Pepper is most decidedly _not_ worried. She’s probably sitting on deck with a steno notepad trying to find a way to make this whole thing sound interesting on paper.

The thing about adventuring, especially the kinds that Tony’s had in his life, is that it’s a very, very hard habit to break. So even though he’s technically retired, he isn’t, per se, out of the game. Even if Jarvis has explicitly forbidden him from any more overseas expeditions it doesn’t mean that he can’t have little _vacations_ like this once in a while. Sometimes you hear a rumor of lost treasure from a secret society, and you just have to go take a little look-see. Not a whole expedition, obviously, that would make it a formal adventure, which it isn’t. It’s . . . a miniature one. A doggie bag. Excitement to-go.

It doesn’t take a genius to point out that dragging a man-sized, waterlogged chest across a lakebed is not the most exciting part of this whole event. Not with Rhodes breathing down his neck — or technically, in his ear, because of how the communications are wired into his suit. Honestly, he wasn’t expecting such great reception so deep underwater, and it’s an even nicer bonus that he didn’t even get electrocuted once.

“You clear yet, Tones?” Rhodey says. He’s grunting a little himself, probably lowering the little tugboat’s chain to make Tony’s way up easier, “You’re really huffing and puffing.”

“I’m an old man with a hole in his chest, take pity on me.” Tony says breathlessly. Is the lightheadedness from the oxygen running out, or is he really just getting old?

He can hear Pepper laugh in the background.

Securing the boat’s chain to a decrepit old chest is a bit like doing one of those puzzle boxes, except the box is _ancient_ and you can’t let it break, not even a little, because then the mystery treasure inside might spill out and Tony thinks  the effort needed to clean up one hundred plus pounds of once-buried treasure would really piss off the great state of whoever-owns-this-goddamn-lake.

“Alright, pull us up.”

“‘Us’, you find a friend? Any weird sea animals you found better stay down there.”

“Every time you open your mouth and my head is not above water, your cut gets one percentage smaller.”

“Alright, alright, ratcheting up now. No weird sea creatures.”

Above him, the little tugboat is blotting out some of the sun. Tony can hear the echo of the mechanism boom around him — it’s eerie as hell, but he shakes it off. “Technically, they’d be _lake_ creatures.”

Rhodey doesn’t respond, because he knows what’s good for him. Or he’s busy earning his keep as a one-man windlass crew.

Being raised to the surface always feels a little like coming back from the dead — which Tony guesses he’s done, hey, so he’s an authority. When the world breaks from muted water into sun-and-sky and he can see Pepper leaning over the edge of the tugboat, waving to him. He breathes a sigh of relief — not because he was ever in any danger, he’s confident in his own equipment and he knows that deep down, Rhodey and Pepper would never let anything _really_ bad happen to him — but because it’s always nice to have that reminder that you’re on the right side of a watery grave.

Getting the chest onto the deck of the tugboat is significantly more difficult. Turns out that after over a hundred years underwater, wood chests start to rot. Who knew? There’s water pouring out of the holes in the sides and the bottom as he hoists it up to Rhodey as best he can, and Rhodey hauls it onto the deck.

Tony rips the mask off his face, happy to breathe clean, unregulated air. He nods at Pepper — see? I’m alive, looks like you’re still employed after all — and gets down to business, kneeling in front of his newest relic.

“I’m not sure there’s anything in there, Tones,” Rhodey says as Tony fumbles with the rusted, waterlogged lock, “It’s pretty light after all that water.”

“Boltcutters? We have anything that can—?” Tony shakes the chain to clarify what he means. It’s what happens when he gets too excited — words start to fail him, he ends up communicating in mostly eyerolls and emphatic hand gestures.

“Here.” Pepper is holding an oversized pair of garden shears — nope, boltcutters, that’s what boltcutters look like.

He nods to the chest. “You want the honors?”

She grins, and he scrambles out of the way.

“What’s this treasure supposed to be?” says Rhodey. He’s watching the whole scene with his arms crossed.

Tony shrugs. “I dunno. Treasure-treasure. The ‘wealth of these United States’, legacy of the Freemasons.”

“And that’s good enough for you?”

“That’s good enough for me.”

It doesn’t take a lot of effort to snap the old lock. Tony thinks he shows a lot of self-restraint in not leaning right over Pepper’s shoulder and dripping lakewater all over her nice coat. She flips the lid. He hears the scrape of metal a second too late —

A sword _rockets_ out of the open chest, straight for Tony’s head. He steps aside on instinct — thank heaven those hairpin reflexes are still there — and the blade _clangs_ against the metal deck behind them.

Rhodey is hurrying to Pepper, ushering her away from the open chest. Tony glances to make sure they’re both alright — he doesn’t see blood, that’s good, they’re both fine — but then he whips back around, because — because —

Because there’s a _man_ standing there, gripping the old sword in his hand.

Tony’s first thought is _old mariner_ — the man certainly looks the part. He’s soaking wet, with a long coat and large brass buttons, dirty khaki trousers (they’re certainly not normal _pants_ , not with that waistline) tucked into high leather boots, dark blonde hair barely tied at the nape of his neck. He looks like a mess. He looks like a _ghost_ , like some tall sailor’s tale spun in the pages of a pulp novel, like a housebound author’s idea of adventure on the rugged high seas.

Mystery man doesn’t say anything. His eyes are sparkling, and his boots _slosh_ with lakewater as he takes a single step towards Tony and raises the sword to chin-height.

The sun glints off the blade, and Tony can _swear_ that the world slows down around them a moment. He can’t look anywhere but the man’s eyes — bright, clear blue, deep and stormy like a hurricane. A sudden wave of unshakable, unjustifiable _fury_ washes over him.

His head rings with the words **_Who dares?!_ **

Out of left field, Rhodey is charging with the boltcutters. He’s angry too, not shy about the noise he’s making, boots pounding against the deck, snarling as he swings at the mariner with all his might.

The sailor sees him coming. He flips the grip on sword so the blade runs parallel to his forearm, and uses the whole thing to parry Rhodey’s blow.

Neither of them are small men. James Rhodes’ size is formidable — tall, lean, a swimmer and a pilot and a boxer — but the sailor is nearly a giant, towering and broad-chested and wielding the old, heavy cutlass with ease.

Where the hell did this guy even _come_ from?

“Tones!”

In the time it takes Tony to snap out of it, the boltcutters are already sailing through the air on their way towards him. He manages to catch them in mostly a kind of hug — the handle clinks heavily against the glass in his chest and sends a shock of brief numbness through him. He’s fumbling with them, trying to get a grip on the handles.

The mariner’s whipped around to face him again, stalking slowly and deliberately across the deck. Rhodey’s behind him, but he doesn’t see him this time, Rhodey’s taking a running leap, aiming to ring the guys’ bell. Tony winds up too, ready to take a swipe.

When Rhodey lands, the mariner’s just — he’s _gone_. The sword clatters to the ground half a second later.

“The hell did he go?!” Rhodey stands and whips around, checking all corners of the deck. He rushes to the side in case the guy jumped, but Tony never heard a splash.

Tony heads over to Pepper, giving the motionless sword a wide berth, just in case. “You okay?”

“I’m fine.” She’s not even finished dusting herself off before flipping her notebook open.

“That’s some treasure you’ve got yourself here.” Rhodey says.  

“The chest is empty too,” says Pepper, even as she edges closer to it. “Unless you count the case — the sheath?”

Tony takes another look at the cutlass. The blade itself is curved and sharp with a large, engraved handguard. He doesn’t recognize the crest, but the whole thing looks clean, unused, fresh-forged. “Not a speck of rust.”

“How long ago you say that ship went down?” Rhodey crosses his arms.

Behind Tony, Pepper’s flipping through her pages. “The _Captain_ sank in 1813. Supposedly, since there was never any newspaper report of it.”

“Wasn’t on the Navy register either,” murmurs Tony, “Or the Coast Guard. Only in a dead Freemason’s journal. Honestly, I’m still a little surprised the wreck was even down there.”

There’s a bit of silence, as the three of them all try to justify what just happened. Even Tony can’t think of any words to fill it.

The journal entry had been very specific. He can see it in his mind’s eye, even now, because he read that thing backwards and forwards until he had the whole damn thing memorized:

 

_10 November 1813_

_The Captain has not been spotted for nigh on four days — we all fear for the cargo she carries. To lose her would be to lose our young nation’s most precious treasure, our hope of fending off Great Britain and her puppet Commonwealth once and for all._

_I told them not to risk it, I told them! The lake will claim what she will, and now too she holds the wealth, the legacy of this Brotherhood — nay, of these United States._

 

“You think he’s a ghost?” Rhodey says finally. There’s no question about who “he” is.

Pepper scoffs. “There’s no such thing as ghosts.”

“No,” says Tony. He’s walked the line between science and — and whatever _this_ is most of his life, “No, there isn’t, but there’s got to be an explanation.”

He reaches for the sword.

It happens in an instant, the blade is against his neck, he’s staring into the crazy mariner’s blue, _blue_ eyes again — he scurries backwards until his back slams into the wall of the bridge.

“ _Be you friend or foe?_ ” The sailor says, and it’s as much in Tony’s head as it is out loud, gruff and scratchy, like a record player that’s almost entirely forgotten how to make the music go. “ _Ally or enemy?!_ ”

“Allies! We’re allies!” Pepper is saying. At the same time Rhodey shouts, “Put the sword down!”

Tony has a brief moment of relief. Thank God that he’s not the only one who can hear him — it?

“ _Put . . ._ ?” The ghost pauses. His blade backs away from Tony’s throat — just enough, just _barely_ enough for Tony to take a deep breath, but no more. “ _You misunderstand. You do not know what I am_.”

“You mind filling us in?” Tony manages, and flinches in anticipation of the press of cold steel against his throat again, but it doesn’t come. “A name, for example?”

It’s strange to describe. The mariner, he — he cleans up? Just the slightest bit. In between blinks, his beard is suddenly combed and trimmed, his shirt tucked back in, all his missing coat buttons returned to him. The blade glints like it’s winking at Tony, even though the sun is setting.

“ _Where does your allegiance lie_ ?” the ghost says, stepping back to look them all over. Tony pats at his throat — no blood. “ _With these United States, or against them?_ ”

“We’re all Americans here, buddy.” Rhodey is tense, and he’s got a loaded pistol in his hands.

The sailor notices the gun but doesn’t seem to mind it, and instead regards Rhodey up and down. Then he turns to Pepper, who defiantly meets his eye contact and doesn’t waver. Then he turns back to Tony.

“What’s your name?” Tony crosses his arms. “And where the hell’d you come from, that sword’s been underwater for 130 years—”

“ _One hundred thirty years?_ ” Again, between blinks, the mariner’s very _being_ changes. He’s suddenly gaunt, thin, with pale skin and sunken eyes. He starts to raise the sword again.

“Whoah there, whoah,” says Rhodey, “It’s 1941. Whatever you are, wherever you’ve been, you’re safe with us.”

Tony more hears than sees the sailor mumble _nineteen-forty-one_ to himself.

“If you put the sword down, we can talk.” Pepper offers. The mariner looks at her and blinks back to himself, how he looked at the beginning of all this, unwashed and wild and angry.

“ _I cannot_.” He says, and there’s something heavy in his voice, like heartbreak. “ _You cannot separate one like me from his nature_.”

“Your nature.” The way Rhodey says it isn’t a question. In his hand the pistol sinks a little bit — not ready to fire, but maybe a little more empathy than he normally shows. The mariner notices and the tip of his blade dips down towards the deck.

Tony’s three steps ahead of putting two and two together. He’s already trying to theorize. How could something bind or recreate an autonomous — for all intents and purposes, a _human soul_ , to an inanimate object? And then have it be buried at the bottom of a lake for a century and some change, and then be strong enough to have the guy spring back out, sprightly as ever? He does seem more splightly than he did a moment ago — he seems like be cleaning up again, bit by bit. His hair now looks washed and combed into a neat, low ponytail.

“You a ghost, Horatio?” Tony says, mostly to break the tension.

‘ _You must first live in order to die, I’m told_.” Captain Nemo says with a roll of his eyes.

“Oh, so he’s a smartass.”

“ _Like lies with like_.”

They glare at each other. Out of the corner of his eye, Tony catches Pepper trying to turn her laugh into a cough behind her hand.

“My name is James Rhodes.” Rhodey’s still got the gun in one hand, but he offers the other for the mariner to shake. “That’s Tony Stark, and this is Pepper Potts. We’re the ones who found your shipwreck.”

Ishmael nods, but makes no move to offer his own hand. Tony wonders if, since he’s some kind of extension of the sword itself — that’s the working theory, anyway — he can have physical contact in whatever kind of form this is. Brushing past the obvious invitation for his own name, he says instead, “ _It was too late in the season to set sail in the first place_.”

“If you don’t give us a name to go by, I’m just going to have to give you one.” Tony says.

“ _In the past, I have been called Captain_.”

Pepper’s pencil is flying across the page, “So the ship was named after you?”  
  
The mariner shakes his head. “ _I only know that I outdate it_.”

“Alright, Captain Morgan, how about we get back to shore, I get out of this getup, and _then_ we do the debrief, okay?” Tony claps, and the wetsuit gloves make a slick rubber _slap_.

“Sounds good to me.” Rhodey nods and flicks the safety back onto the gun. He offers it, handle first, to Pepper. “You mind?”

“I don’t think we’ll have to worry about him,” she says softly.

Tony follows her gaze to where Francis Drake himself is staring out over the lake, paying little mind to any of them. The beard is gone entirely now — without it he looks so very, very young.

Despite not knowing exactly what he is, Tony finds it hard to imagine waking up 130 years in the future. Initially, he thinks he’d be excited, able to easily integrate with whatever new paths technology has forged. Maybe they’d have a more permanent solution for his heart.

Rhodey hands him a change of clothes, and as he takes them Tony thinks about what it’d be like to lose him. To lose Rhodey, Jarvis, and Pepper, and even Namor, in all his salt-crusted grumpiness. (Who is he kidding — Namor can survive anything, he knows that. The man’s a cockroach with an aptitude for open sea.) But joking aside, everything he knew — everything that he thinks is cutting-edge, everything he takes for granted — would just be gone.

“Later.” He hands the clothes back.

Rhodey seems to understand. “I’ll get us back to shore.”

He joins the mariner at the railing. It’s hard to think of what to say first, or what to say at all.

“ _If you three are Americans_ ,” Blackbeard rumbles after a while, “ _There must at least still be an America_.”

“There is.” Tony nods. “It’s not half bad.”

“ _And what is it you do, when you are not disturbing old shipwrecks_ ?” There’s a hint of teasing in his voice — not in his voice, in Tony’s head, because he can feel the words like a radio wave directly to his brain. Oh man, _radio_. Tony suddenly can’t wait to blow this guy’s mind.

“Hey, I was down there too. It was cold and wet and miserable, you should be thanking me.”

Long John Silver — Tony is very quickly running out of famous pirates, and the name John doesn’t fit the man beside him at all — chuckles softly, but doesn’t say anything. His coat seems to be slowing drying into a dark navy blue.

“So let me get this straight. You _are_ the sword, sword and you are one, the one true wielder, King Arthur-style, that kind of thing?”

“ _Nothing like King Arthur_ .” He takes a moment. “ _I fought in the Revolution. I was . . . enchanted, I suppose? To be a tool of liberty, to fight injustice and tyranny. Over time, I became merely a weapon to be wielded_.”

“I’m happy you can — that you can _wield_ yourself though, that’s very progressive.” The joke doesn’t seem to land, and Tony fumbles a bit for the recovery. “But I’m not calling you Captain, you’re not the one who’s in charge around here.”

“ _I was under the impression that James Rhodes is in charge_.”

It’s hard to argue with that. “We’re explorers. I bankroll the whole thing, Rhodey’s my right-hand man who is paid very highly to pull my ass out of the fire, and Pepper follows us around and writes about it. Well, not so much anymore. We used to go all over the world. Some — some stuff happened, over in Germany—”

Tony trails to a stop, because he can see the confusion pinching the other man’s face. “That’s right, Germany wasn’t even— 1813, God, that’s, that’s what, Prussia? No, Holy Rome?”

The sailor — revolutionary? Freedom fighter? The guy _really_ needs to pick a name — shakes his head. “ _Dissolved. Napoleon rules the Confederation of the Rhine_.”

“Not anymore. Not even close.” Tony bites back a laugh. “Oh my dear Jim-boy, you have missed _so_ much.”

“ _Nelson and Henry Morgan I know of, but who is Jim-boy?_ ”

“Jim Hawkins. Treasure Island? It’s a book, probably after your time. We can get you a copy.”

“. . . _I would like that_.”

There’s a moment where they just look out over the lake together. Tony can see the shoreline in the distance, and suddenly he’s very concerned about how Billy Bones over here is going to take America of 1941 in all at once. He still has the cutlass — himself? In his hand. Tony is incredibly curious about the mechanics in play there. Can he only manifest himself when he’s holding it? Is it possible for him to only wear it, on his belt, or does it have to physically be in his hand? That’s not even delving into the idea of manifestation itself, how the three of them are all seeing and hearing him, how his voice appears in their heads — or at least Tony’s — like it’s scratching an itch in their minds.

Tony feels like there’s a lot of research ahead of him. No treasure, not in the traditional sense, but maybe the trip was worth it anyway. After all, what the hell was he even going to _do_ with more gold?

“We’re probably about fifteen minutes out.” Rhodey calls from the bridge.

“Alright, Mr. Stevenson, you and I both need a change of clothes.” Tony goes to clap him on the shoulder like he would another human being, until he remembers what the guy _is_ . Or at least, what he’s _not_. “Can you even change your clothes?”

Stevenson — Tony likes that one, that’s probably going to stick — looks down at himself, at his century-old uniform. He glances at what Tony, Rhodey, and Pepper are all wearing. “ _I am not sure_.”

“Well, no time like the present. Wait until you see _zippers_.”

**Author's Note:**

> Full disclaimer: No additional research was done for this fic aside from double-checking dates and linking here in the notes. Everything else stems from my own personal interest in 18th/19th century Great Lakes history.
> 
> > The title is from a sea shanty by Stan Rogers, called [Barrett's Privateers](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIwzRkjn86w).  
> > Using Freemasons as shameless handwaving is absolutely, 100% taken from the National Treasure movies.  
> > A windlass is the device used to manually raise and lower the anchor of a ship before mechanical power, the thing where a bunch of crew has to push a very large pinwheel-looking spindle on deck.  
> > A cutlass is a curved flat blade with one cutting edge and a large handguard. The iconic "pirate sword".  
> > In November 1813, the U.S. had just retaken Lake Erie from British forces during the War of 1812.  
> > November 10th is a direct reference to the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald, a very famous Great Lakes wreck (with [accompanying folk song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vST6hVRj2A)).  
> > Radio wasn't well established until the late 1800s.  
> > The German States weren't unified under the word "German" until 1871. Germany's history as a central nation-state gets more complicated and harder to explain the further you go back.  
> > Steve still thinks Napoleon rules half of Europe, since he was arguably at the height of his power when Steve went down.  
> >Treasure Island was first serialized in 1881-1882, and published as one volume in 1883.  
> > Zippers weren't patented in the United States until 1917.
> 
> Tony's Literary/Nautical Nicknames, In Order:  
> > [Horatio Nelson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horatio_Nelson,_1st_Viscount_Nelson), prominent British naval strategist and leader during the Napoleonic Wars (1803-1815)  
> > Captain Nemo, from Jules Verne's [Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty_Thousand_Leagues_Under_the_Sea)  
> > Ishmael, the protagonist of Herman Melville's [Moby Dick](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moby-Dick)  
> > [Henry Morgan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Morgan), Welsh privateer, active 1663-1671  
> > [Francis Drake](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Drake), British privateer, active 1563-1596  
> > [Blackbeard/Edward Teach/Edward Thatch](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackbeard), Pirate, active 1716-1718  
> > Long John Silver, Jim Hawkins, and Billy Bones are all from [Treasure Island](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treasure_Island), written by Robert Louis Stevenson.
> 
> If you liked this work and feel inclined to share it, here are the [tumblr](https://vextant.tumblr.com/post/181827481916/super-pumped-to-reveal-my-iron-man-noir-fic-for) and [twitter](https://twitter.com/vvextant/status/1082493823136210944) posts, but of course there's never any pressure to do so. Thank you so much for reading! :D


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